Insomnia is a sleep disorder resulting in a person’s inability to fall asleep or that they cannot stay asleep for a decent length of time. These people experience little or no stage 4 or REM sleep.
Sleep is normally regulated in a person’s brainstem, specifically the reticular activating system (RAS), which is located just below their brains. Signaling from this area induces or eliminates sleep in a circadian rhythm. Melatonin is a neurotransmitter involved in maintaining circadian rhythms as well as instigating activity in the RAS. Fundamentally, insomnia results from the disruption of circadian rhythms or melatonin activity. People suffering from insomnia usually complain that they can’t close their eyes or turn off their minds long enough to get some rest. Often, when these are a patient’s primary complaints there is an underlying cause which must be found to cure the insomnia. Causative facts about insomnia are that they can come from psychological, chemical, or physical sources. For example, some causes can be due to depression, anxiety, pain, medication side effects, caffeine, or something as simple as bloating.
There are three different types of insomnia. These are transient, acute, or chronic insomnia. Often the type is related to the cause.
Transient insomnia lasts only a few nights to a few weeks. This is often the result of jet lag, medication side effects, caffeine, transient stress, etc. This form of insomnia can come and go and is then termed intermittent insomnia.
Acute insomnia lasts over a period no longer than six months, no shorter than 3 weeks. The sources of this form of insomnia are similar to that of transient insomnia.
Chronic insomnia occurs nearly every night for a period of a month or longer. This is the most serious form of insomnia and will severely exhaust this patient.
Insomnia
Insomnia is usually caused by another disease or psychological problem. In this case, medical or psychological help may be useful. This implies there are a wide variety of treatments available to the insomniac.
Insomnia treatments are that they vary in effectiveness and often are ineffective unless the underlying physical or psychological cause is addressed. The class of drug commonly used to treat insomnia is benzodiazapines. Other classes of drugs with differing effectiveness and drawbacks include antihistamines, antidepressants, or antipsychotics. The facts about insomnia drug treatment are that all sedative drugs can potentially cause a psychological dependence where the individual does not believe they can sleep without the aid of drugs.
Other treatment options of varying effectiveness include hypnotherapy, acupuncture, dietary supplements, or herbal remedies.
